Excerpt from transcript, Hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: "FY06 Foreign Affairs Budget," February 16, 2005

Excerpt from transcript, Hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: "FY06 Foreign Affairs Budget," February 16, 2005

SEN. MEL MARTINEZ (R-FL): I wanted to ask you two very specific areas in the area of Latin America. One is Plan Colombia. How do you perceive the success of Plan Colombia? And where do you think it will be going in this upcoming budget?

SEC. RICE: Well, we obviously have to continue support for Plan Colombia, particularly at a time when we have a president in President Uribe who has put his country on a course to really deal with the narcotrafficking of FARC. The Plan Colombia, of course, does not operate in a vacuum. It does operate in the context of an Andean initiative, which I think is also very important, because as we've said, if you eradicate in one area and you have growth in another, this will not work.

We're also looking to the Colombians for what I will call more normalization of our relationships. For instance, Bob Zoellick, when he was USTR -- I guess he still is USTR, but will shortly not be -- has engaged the Colombians in discussions on an FTA, which would give longer-term economic growth to Colombia.

So we will continue the efforts of Plan Colombia in the way that they've been continued, but I think as they make progress against the FARC, you'll want to see the transitioning of some of this to an effort to grow the economy, to do all of the things that will ultimately make this a really stable democracy. And I think we believe we have a very excellent partner in President Uribe.